The Chinese name for a form of Buddhism in which insights are gained through meditation. It developed into Zen Buddhism when introduced by Chinese monks to Japan in the seventh century A.D. (See Zen)

School of Budhism with heavy Chinese influences; better known in the West by its Japanese name of Zen.

also called Zen; see Contemplation and Meditation.

Buddhist, branch of Buddhism introduced from India to China by Bodhidharma also the Patron Saint of Japanese Martial Arts, in Japanese, Zen Buddhism.

is officially held to be a Chinese adaptation of Indian dhyana meditation practices, and is also often said to be influenced by indigenous Chinese Taoism. According to traditional accounts, the school was founded by the semi-legendary Indian monk Bodhidharma who, according to the Anthology of the Patriarchal Hall, arrived in China c. 527CE and taught at the Shaolin Monastery. Bodhidharma was believed to be the twenty-eighth patriarch in a lineage that extended all the way back to Shakyamuni Buddha. Chandrakirti . The sixth-century Indian pandit, a disciple of Nagarjuna, who elucidated Nagarjuna's exposition of the middle way (madhyamaka), presenting it specifically as what is now known as the view of the Prasangika-Madhyamaka (or Middle Way Consequentialist) school, whoe texts are the basis of the study of the middle way in all Tibetan traditions.